Civ 7 Roguelite

[Piranga]

Mementos and leader specific legacy cards, in game statistical bonuses and abilities, are locked behind earning xp per invidiual leader (including each leaders alternate form). This has to be one of the worst ideas in the entire game. This type of "roguelite" progression works well in games where an entire round playtime lasts under an hour....in Civ though...what were the devs thinking?

After a 20 hour round as Hatshepsut, where I completed each era's cultural goal and won the game with the world's fair, I ended up at level 4 of her progress bar in main menus. Nowhere close to unlocking the level 9 memento.
XP seems scales per level as well. 100 xp needed for level 2. At level 4 I'm at 400/550 xp needed for level 5. I'm guessing it will be 3 or 4 more games with her to unlock her final memento.

It's just an insane amount of gameplay needed to unlock things...and again thats just for the single leader!

I wouldn't mind if this leveling system just unlocked badges, titles, banners and all that other completely useless profile nonsense they added. But locking playable features behind an insane amount of grinding should not ever have been a part of the Civ series.

 

[bladex1200]

Agreed on this. I like Civ 7 but the mementos system is just there to scratch the zero-attention-span everything-must-have-progression tendency that a lot of gamers today have. Civ was never meant to be a collect-a-thon and game balance will likely be impacted by Memento-meta. I know you can turn them off in multiplayer and just opt to not have them in singleplayer but they seem thematically-incoherent to have and like something that was likely requested by publishers to retain players for longer between DLC updates.

 

[Zaarin]

This definitely feels like it was 2K's idea. And probably a hard line drawn by Firaxis that they wouldn't monetize it.

 

[bladex1200]

This definitely feels like it was 2K's idea. And probably a hard line drawn by Firaxis that they wouldn't monetize it.

Monetizing likely would've killed the entire system as people would just be perpetually banning it in multiplayer games (or standardizing that you'd have to buy and use the same 2 to ensure no advantage between players), which are all community-organized anyways. If Civ 7 was aiming to be an e-sport I can see why monetization might have been attractive to 2K but I do feel that given the circumstances of the game, Mementos and Leader unlocks were likely never meant to be microtransactions and were meant more to just feed into the perpetual "log in every day and play a game!" progression scheme that also suits the EXP system (another absurd appendage lmao)

 

[Graethyenne]

It's way too early for me to tell how much I will want to play with each leader. But it sure does seem like I am gonna play more games than my Civ 5/6 standard of "play until I win with them and move on". At 15 hours per campaign (that's a mad up number, I expect to get faster as I play more) that's ~100 campaigns to hit my prior title numbers, so 4 ish per leader? But I can definitely imagine playing more games than that.

I guess what I am saying is the top end mementos are more for folks who lock in on a leader and rarely play others (they exist I have seen their posts on these forums) and less of a "gotta catch'em all' feature. But time will tell.

G

 

[cuc]

This definitely feels like it was 2K's idea. And probably a hard line drawn by Firaxis that they wouldn't monetize it.

In a Chinese interview, they said the metaprogression was added late in development, and they balanced Civ7 based on not using them.
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1vFFVenEQq/?t=326

There are a few Chinese interviews with info I don't think I've heard elsewhere. Two others: https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1F3wKemEt3 https://www.bilibili.com/video/V1TTf5YrESz

 

[Acken]

I don't use them, kind of kills my fun of developing a strategy based on the tools I was initially given.

 

[Leyrann]

what were the devs thinking?

They wrote an entire dev diary about that.

To summarize: they wanted to give players a way to show off how much they'd played the game, get a tangible reward for playing, have long-term goals to work towards, or however you prefer to frame the mechanic.

It's just an insane amount of gameplay needed to unlock things...and again thats just for the single leader!

I don't think it's designed with the idea that you unlock everything - after all, if you unlock everything in 20, or heck, even 300 hours of playing, it quickly (for a certain meaning of the word) stops being a measure of how much you've played the game. If you make it take 5000 hours to unlock everything, even veteran players can use it as such.

But locking playable features behind an insane amount of grinding should not ever have been a part of the Civ series.

You're not intended to grind them. That's why you can simply not use mementos, and why in multiplayer you can disable them by game rule. They're meant to be a background progression bar, basically.

Mind: I don't love the system myself either. But I can understand the thought behind it and I'll just take it at whichever pace stuff unlocks for me.

At 15 hours per campaign (that's a mad up number, I expect to get faster as I play more)

...I've played for almost 17 hours and I'm not even halfway through Exploration yet. On normal game speed (although long Ages).

And sure I'll get faster too but I doubt I'll ever reach a point where an average Age takes me less than 5-6 hours.

 

[rocksinmypath]

I like mementos. It looks like the devs really tried to make 7 more approachable to new players while giving returning heavy users something to celebrate as well. I don't agree at all that Civ is not the sort of game for this sort of system. In fact, if it takes 20 hours to unlock almost half of one leader, with 50 leaders (with DLCs in far future), that's only 2000 hours to unlock everything.

 

[Graethyenne]

They wrote an entire dev diary about that.

To summarize: they wanted to give players a way to show off how much they'd played the game, get a tangible reward for playing, have long-term goals to work towards, or however you prefer to frame the mechanic.



I don't think it's designed with the idea that you unlock everything - after all, if you unlock everything in 20, or heck, even 300 hours of playing, it quickly (for a certain meaning of the word) stops being a measure of how much you've played the game. If you make it take 5000 hours to unlock everything, even veteran players can use it as such.



You're not intended to grind them. That's why you can simply not use mementos, and why in multiplayer you can disable them by game rule. They're meant to be a background progression bar, basically.

Mind: I don't love the system myself either. But I can understand the thought behind it and I'll just take it at whichever pace stuff unlocks for me.



...I've played for almost 17 hours and I'm not even halfway through Exploration yet. On normal game speed (although long Ages).

And sure I'll get faster too but I doubt I'll ever reach a point where an average Age takes me less than 5-6 hours.

15 hours and I have just started the modern age (1/2 way through the set-up mini-game, no turns yet). But I can definitely see a 2-4 hours per age timeline in my future. Especially because I went heavy warfare this game - Xerxes KoK Persia -> Mongols. Eliminated an AI in each and also battered a 3rd into irrelevance. A 4th was eaten by IPs (but I am super low difficulty since it is game one).

G

 

[MasterPaw]

I wasn't a big fan of it initially but after seeing how it works it's fine to me

You can disable for multiplayer or even solo, but allow for customization if you want

Could be interesting to have negative memento to balance things

 

[Chuy1530]

15 hours and I have just started the modern age (1/2 way through the set-up mini-game, no turns yet). But I can definitely see a 2-4 hours per age timeline in my future. Especially because I went heavy warfare this game - Xerxes KoK Persia -> Mongols. Eliminated an AI in each and also battered a 3rd into irrelevance. A 4th was eaten by IPs (but I am super low difficulty since it is game one).

G

Yeah war-heavy games take much longer than more peaceful games.

I don’t mind mementos. The entire system can be safely ignored if you want since it was balanced without them. I don’t think it adds anything to the game for me but it doesn’t break anything either.

 

[evonannoredars]

I'm probably not going to use any of the unlockable bonuses because I want to challenge myself, but I know people who aren't as civ-obsessed who like the idea of playing with them. A lot of the ones I've seen are or border on overpowered, I think it'd be better if they were really minor benefits (or purely cosmetic unlocks).

 

[Krajzen]

Fun fact: due to the fact I consciously draw the line at how much time I spend on video games (and even less for civ, just a single one among them), I VERY rarely play one civ more than once unless it's like a super favorite of mine or scenario or multiplayer - after all, as those games have like 20 - 50 civs, it is easy to spend a lot of time just going through the roster

So the people with my mentality can immediately say bye bye to the system of earning exp on per leader basis

It would be better if those were akin to steam achievements: when do X thing across Y games, with some of them civ- or leader-specific, you get points...

EDIT
Well it is a slight improvement that unlocks are per leader in a game with half as many leaders as there are civs, but still, I'd first try out all leaders before replaying any of them...

 

[pokiehl]

I dunno, I really like it. It’s just fun. My friends who are all more causal than me have also been getting a kick out of it.

 

[chazzycat]

3 or 4 games is too much?? I thought this site was called civ FANATICS. Those are rookie numbers!

 

[Vennlig]

I quite like the system now, despite some initial reservations, but I have been wondering are we "penalized" in terms of getting mementos by not playing online speed or does the XP scale? (I never play online speed so was curious)

 

[RedCourtJester]

This kind of feature reminds me of other extremely grindy meta systems like Guild Wars 2's legendary weapons/armor (and to my understanding certain items in other MMOs function similarly).

The idea in that game is that (a) no one is expected to complete everything and in fact most gamers are presumed to hardly touch it; and (b) the amount of time/resources creates a sort scarcity that makes such achievements function more like legitimate trophies or highly individualized forms of self-expression.

I don't think it is the worst thing for a game to add as optional fun, but players definitely need to shift their expectations away from completionism because that sort of long-form roadblocking is not pragmatically designed for it. Hell, I didn't even bother with Civ VI's leader achievements because that represented too much of a time sink. Pick a smaller subset of which leaders' mementos you want, don't be looking at "meta" systems as something you need to conquer or you will end up mired in your own dirty household while your child is neglected and your spouse leaves you (which I have seen happen to MMO players).

 

[Siptah]

The fact that you need to get every legacy path in each age 3 times in order to get a leader to max level is… bleh

Otherwise I like it for the mini-progress. I haven‘t used a memento yet though, and haven‘t reached a legend ability unlock.

 

[Patine]

Mementos and leader specific legacy cards, in game statistical bonuses and abilities, are locked behind earning xp per invidiual leader (including each leaders alternate form). This has to be one of the worst ideas in the entire game. This type of "roguelite" progression works well in games where an entire round playtime lasts under an hour....in Civ though...what were the devs thinking?

After a 20 hour round as Hatshepsut, where I completed each era's cultural goal and won the game with the world's fair, I ended up at level 4 of her progress bar in main menus. Nowhere close to unlocking the level 9 memento.
XP seems scales per level as well. 100 xp needed for level 2. At level 4 I'm at 400/550 xp needed for level 5. I'm guessing it will be 3 or 4 more games with her to unlock her final memento.

It's just an insane amount of gameplay needed to unlock things...and again thats just for the single leader!

I wouldn't mind if this leveling system just unlocked badges, titles, banners and all that other completely useless profile nonsense they added. But locking playable features behind an insane amount of grinding should not ever have been a part of the Civ series.

Sounds SIMILAR to AoE3.